1914 Civil War Veterans Reunion: Jacksonville, Florida - Original Full Length Version

This is the original, full length version of the 1914 Civil War Veterans Reunion, filmed on May 6-8, 1914. The video is speed adjusted and optimized for maximum clarity.Show more

Reunions of Civil War veterans from both the North and South were a prominent feature of public life in the United States in the early decades of the 20th century. This 1914 silent film records the meeting of 40,000 Confederate veterans in Jacksonville, Florida, nearly a half century after the end of the war. Titles are used to explain each sequence. Aging veterans dance to the music of two fiddlers and gather to parade on foot, by horse, or in cars. Also shown are crowd scenes, general views of the camp with its tents, an emergency medical tent staffed by the Red Cross, and thousands of veterans dining together in a mess tent. Scenes from the Sons of Confederate Veterans Parade include marching bands, a passing electric street car, and the Forrest Cavalry of Tennessee, named after Confederate cavalry general Nathan Bedford Forrest. An African-American loyal to the Confederacy is shown, as well as F.M. Iremonger, said to be the youngest living Confederate veteran.

An estimated one million men served at one point or another in the Confederate military during the Civil War. About 15,000 of them came from Florida, a very significant portion of the sparse, agrarian population.